Lawmakers say universities should be military-free zones

Philippines lawmakers have said that the protection of the University of the Philippines from military and police operations on campus should be enshrined in law and that this protection should be extended to all the country’s public universities and colleges.

A raft of bills to that effect has been tabled by opposition politicians in the country’s parliament in recent weeks.

Philippines congresswoman Sarah Elago this week tabled a resolution calling on the House of Representatives to ensure that schools and universities in the country are ‘zones of peace’ that are “free from police and military presence, intervention, harassment and intimidation”.

“It is imperative that the members of the House of Representatives … uphold and protect academic freedom of educational institutions,” she said.

The resolution and the raft of bills came in the wake of the unilateral abrogation on 18 January of an accord between the University of the Philippines (UP) and the Department of National Defense (DND), known as the UP-DND accord. The agreement prohibits military and police presence on the UP campuses without prior notification to the university authorities.

The 1989 accord was intended to protect students, faculty and staff from police and military incursions to suppress dissent and campus protests. It is seen as an important curb on state authorities’ powers to interfere in university activities.

Rescinding the accord, National Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana described it as “obsolete” and a “hindrance in providing effective security, safety and welfare of the students, faculty and employees of UP”.

He claimed the 1989 pact was being used as a “shield” by the New People’s Army insurgency group in its “ongoing clandestine recruitment of students to the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed wing, the New People’s Army”.

But Elago, of the Kabataan Party, or youth party, accused security officials of “sweeping and baseless accusations” about radicalisation and recruitment in universities and colleges by the Communist insurgency group.

The police, then under the Defense Department, was also party to the UP-DND accord when it was signed. The police are now under the Department of the Interior and Local Government which has said it will stick to its agreement with UP.

Abrogation sparks protests

Presidential spokesman Harry Roque, himself a former UP law professor, said President Rodrigo Duterte had welcomed the Defense Department move. But the unexpected abrogation sparked protests on the university’s campuses. The UP system has eight constituent universities around the country.

UP Diliman Chancellor Fidel Nemenzo said during the protests: “If the DND says, as it does, that it would neither post military nor police inside UP’s campuses, nor suppress academic freedom and freedom of expression, why abrogate the accord?”

A similar agreement with DND exists with Polytechnic University of the Philippines, which Lorenzana has said he would also abrogate, saying the two universities should not get “special treatment”.

“Lorenzana is right,” said Nemenzo. “We should have the same agreement for all universities so that academic freedom in all universities is respected.”

“It’s about time we talk with other universities. Our concerns are their concerns as well,” Nemenzo said.

On 6 February UP alumni and supporters gathered at the university’s campus in Diliman, Quezon City, for the launch of #DefendUP Network, to unite the efforts of the UP community to uphold and defend academic freedom.

“We share the common principle that UP is and must remain a safe space for free thought, expression, criticism and dissent,” the network said.

“We are united in upholding the 1989 UP-DND accord and demanding its reinstatement,” the new network group added.

A raft of new bills

It has not been lost on lawmakers that the Philippines Congress can legislate an equivalent measure in the charter of all state universities and colleges, including UP, or extend it by law to all, in order to protect academic freedom.

A raft of new bills has been filed in the past weeks by lawmakers to institutionalise the 1989 accords and protect academic freedom.

Four senators, Sonny Angara, Nancy Binay, Grace Poe and Joel Villanueva, filed a bill to amend the UP legal charter and enshrine the accord in its charter to protect it from abrogation.

Others sought to enshrine the accord in law and extend it to all state universities and colleges.

The Makabayan bloc or Patriotic Coalition of the People which also includes civil society organisations, grassroots groups and unions, filed bills in the House of Representatives to institutionalise the UP-DND accord in the UP charter and extend it to all universities in the country.

In late January Senator Francis Pangilinan, president of the centre-left Liberal Party, tabled a more far-reaching Academic Freedom Act which would bar unauthorised police or military operations in all state universities and colleges.

“All institutions of higher learning, especially all state universities and colleges, should be centres of free thought,” said Pangilinan on filing the bill on 26 January.

The proposed act would give the administrations of state universities “primary responsibility” to ensure order on their campuses, among them the granting of permission for the entry of uniformed personnel in their compound.

The bill states that any operations by uniformed personnel would only be allowed with prior coordination with the institutions’ administrations, though it would allow personnel to enter campuses in the case of “hot pursuit and similar occasions of emergency” or in cases of “ordinary transit through the premises”.

Under the measure, no university or college student, faculty or employee should be subjected to custodial investigation or detention without an arrest warrant and without prior notice to the appropriate university official.

The act, if signed into law, also envisages penalties. According to the draft, violation of the provisions would result in “administrative liability”, which will be “considered grave whenever such non-compliance results in serious physical injury or death of a student, faculty, employee or guest” of a state university or college.

Another bill was filed in the Senate by opposition senator Leila de Lima which would effectively make permanent the 1989 UP-DND accord to protect the university’s academic freedom.

“This bill prohibits military operations within the campuses, except under conditions of lawless violence, invasion, or rebellion and during civil defence operations upon invitation by UP authorities,” she said.

It also seeks to ensure the “exchange and expression of ideas are free from intimidation from coercive forces of the state” within the university premises.

The need to protect students, staff and faculty from harassment by police, inherent in Elago’s resolution and De Lima’s bill, is related to the use of ‘red-tagging’ or naming universities as Communist recruitment centres and goes further than reinstating the UP-DND accord to protect academic freedoms.

In recent years Duterte officials have used ‘red-tagging’ to accuse many of their critics of being communists, according to civil society groups.

The country’s National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict named some 30 universities as New People’s Army recruitment centres. The red-tagging list includes top universities UP, Ateneo de Manila University and De La Salle University.

Talks between DND and UP

The Senate on 26 January had adopted a resolution urging DND and UP to “revisit” their 1989 agreement and called for a dialogue between the parties.

Talks began between DND officials and UP on 4 February, brokered by chair of the Commission on Higher Education, Prospero de Vera, himself a former UP professor. The purpose of the talks was to find common ground to resolve DND security concerns regarding the campus and UP’s determination to protect academic freedom.

Even coming to the table for a dialogue with UP was seen by some lawmakers as DND “taking a step backward” from its previous unilateral stance.

However, on reinstating the accord, Lorenzana has said publicly only that he would “think about it”.

DND spokesman Arsenio Andolong said on 5 February that during the talks the DND “expressed its openness to listen to the position of the UP administration”. He added the talks would continue “as we seek ways to move forward and strengthen our collaboration with academic institutions all over the country”.

Andolong said the DND was also “hopeful that members of the UP community will be open to working with us to ensure that our youth do not become victims of those who would lead them down the path of lawlessness and destruction”.